Really, Really Mad Max

As we consider the wreckage that was once Mel Gibson's career, it occurs to us that we never really liked the guy's movies.

That's not quite fair. Tequila Sunrise is one of our favorite noir pictures, combining all the elements -- tough guys with questionable morals, betrayal by a friend and a girl worth the risk. But apart from that, we've never seen many of his movies. Skimming over the IMDB filmography, we were surprised to discover that we've barely seen any of them: Mad Max, a few Lethal Weapons, What Women Want. Oh, and one of those Twilight Zone knockoffs that helped put the coffin-nail in M. Night Shyamalan's career. It was a lousy movie, although it would have been better if he'd worn his clerical collar all the way through, instead of just at the end. We automatically give a thumbs-up to pictures about guys in clerical collars fighting extraterrestrial invaders.

Which reminds us that religion and politics, not to mention sex, have often played a significant role in Gibson's image. We avoided The Passion of the Christ, not because of the various controversies that accompanied its release, but we'd already read the book. In the background for many years has been Gibson's close association with an obscure schismatic church body, which the press insists on identifying as "Catholic." As we've said before, these sedvacantist crazies are about as Catholic as Pat Robertson. He thought Bill Clinton was taking orders from a secret paymaster. And then there's the drunken anti-semitic rant.

Anyway, it's over now. The series of phone calls leaked to the press (click here for a rundown) has pretty much doomed Gibson as a public figure. Using the most vulgar language imaginable, he abuses his girlfriend verbally -- and also, it appears, physically. Oh, and endangers their child. People don't like that. When Scott Fitzgerald said that there are no second acts in American lives, he was utterly and completely mistaken. America, the land of self-reinvention, is all about second and third acts. Any person, having achieved even a modest level of fame -- or infamy -- has almost unlimited access to further fame in the future. Almost unlimited, because beyond a certain point, the public simply decides to hate you. And, like Fatty Arbuckle before him, Gibson has hit that point.

Now, let's take a grain of salt. Remember that these tapes were leaked in the middle of (redundancy alert!) an ugly custody battle. And remember that there is some speculation that they have been altered. We do not doubt that there is skullduggery going on here, and that somebody desires to make Gibson look especially terrible and the girlfriend look unrealistically good. But the thing is that they've succeeded. Even if the tapes have been altered, he said some baaaadd things. We don't know what will happen in court, but we are pretty certain that, in the court of public opinion, Gibson has been tried and found icky. He may make a few more movies, but they will fail. He may even find a niche, marketing some product to religious extremists who don't consider anti-semitism or spousal abuse to be necessarily contrary to their faith. But so far as the big spotlight goes, he is toast.

And yet, here's the real joke, on all of us: He's still mind-numbingly rich. Even if his separated wife and vengeful girlfriend wind up with most of the bank account, the guy will still die with more money than we can imagine. Nice guys may or may not finish last, but sons-of-bitches often do seem to finish first.

Naked Girls Reading

Where, oh where, was the burlesque revival when Father Anonymous was a callow youth? And where above all things was Naked Girls Reading?

The concept is pretty nearly self-explanatory, but you can read more about it by clicking the link above, or going straight to the creators' site. Basically, pretty women who normally strip to their pasties and juggle flaming batons turn over a new page (pun borrowed from the Globe and Mail) to get naked and read books out loud. Any books at all.

Sexist? Sure. Pretentious? You betcha. And creepy, too. Consider this:

The women describe the NGR salon as magical, entrancing and enchanting. “It has a courtesan feel about it,” [Tanya] Cheex says. “It’s seductive, because we’re naked, and, at the same time, comforting, like listening to your mother reading to you when you were little.”

[Sauci Calla] Horra adds: “In burlesque, we unveil our bodies. In Naked Girls Reading, we unveil our souls.”

Shudder. And yet creepy sexist pretension had a place in our hearts, back in the 80s, and we'd be lying if we said it was entirely homeless even today.

We Told You It Would Happen

We said that you would soon see press reports identifying LCMS President-elect Matthew Harrison as the "conservative" contender in his race with Gerard Kieschnick. And here you are.

We are disappointed, of course, for all the reasons we spelled out the other day. And we are even more disappointed to see this in BeliefNet, which is devoted to writing on religion, and ought therefore to be more sensitive to the genuine complexity of affairs like this, which rarely boil down to left vs. right.

But we are more than disappointed, and a little amused, by Nicole Neroulias' almost self-mocking disclaimer:

I haven't reported on the LCMS before, but this sounds like another case of intrafaith conflict between conservatives and liberals ....

Well, no, it doesn't. And if you think it does, shouldn't you check with people who might know better?

Seriously Old Books

According to the legend, Byzantine prince with healing powers was called from Constantinople to the northern part of what is today Ethiopia. There, this Abba Garima founded a monastery, and for twenty years performed miracles of healing.

The legend describes some other miracles as well, of a fairly conventional sort. Some of his spittle gave life to a bit of clay. He wrote out the four Gospels in a single day, aided by the fact that God lengthened the day. That sort of stuff.

Here's the cool part, though: the monastery really does own some beautiful illuminated Gospel manuscripts. They are in the Byzantine style, with text in Ge'ez. Scholars have only looked at them a few times over the past 60 years, and the consensus had been that they dated to roughly 1100. Even this would make them remarkably old, particularly since many Ethiopian manuscripts have been destroyed in war.

But it gets better, because a French scholar named Jacques Mercier, presumably with the permission of the monks, removed a few parchment fragments that had broken off, and took them home to be carbon-dated. And guess what? One of the manuscripts may date somewhere between AD 330-540, and the other between AD 430-650.

This makes them among the very oldest illuminated Christian manuscripts in existence. And by the way, Abba Garima is said to have come to Ethiopia in 494, which makes it possible that he really did have a hand in creating these.

Score one for tradition.

He's "The Pope's Favorite Rabbi" ... for a Reason

We have long believed that many of Benedict XVI's missteps as Pope, typified by Regensburg, have been the result of a long academic career. In the classroom, a professor can tease, provoke and sometimes bully, all within the true spirit of his profession. Even the best of them play to a comparatively small audience.

In a HuffPo piece, the comically prolific Jacob Neusner offers a scholar's take on the Ratzinger papacy. Bottom line: he agrees with us. So much so, indeed, that he doesn't see the missteps as missteps; he sees them as guarantors of integrity:

The first five years of the papacy of Cardinal Ratzinger have revealed these traits along with abundant humility and kindness and love. But the world will take some time to get used to its scholar-pope, who speaks forthrightly about fundamental issues and lets the chips fall where they may.

The Muslims learned that fact in Regensburg, when the Pope in a profound lecture called into question the contribution of Islam to civilization.

The Anglicans learned that fact when the Pope in a gesture of honesty invited the Anglican priesthood to join the Church.

The Jews learned that fact when the Pope reverted to a liturgy that called into question the faith of Judaism.

In all three cases ... the scholar-pope had told the truth as Catholic Christianity at heart sees it: Islam cannot compete with Christianity for moral insight, the Anglicans will be welcome home, and the Jews would be better off in the Church. Pope Benedict spoke like a scholar and pronounced Christian truth as the infallible Bishop of Rome pronounced it. A scholar could do no less.

The pressing issue, of late, is sexual molestation. The debate over the pre-pope's handling of one case may well color the remainder of his papacy. We continue to believe that the Church of Rome has been institutionally crippled by both bad customs (sacerdotal clubbiness and fear of cleansing sunlight), bad psychology (the myth that child molesters can be "cured") and bad theology (the mistaken focus upon individual acts of sin, rather than upon the alien power of same). Neusner, however, gives a sensitive description of the matter as many Roman Catholics surely perceive it:

The current issue that troubles the peace is Cardinal Ratzinger's prior disposition of the case of a priest guilty of sexually abusing children. Christian charity called for forgiveness of the priest, a broken dying penitent. Justice demanded excommunication. Cardinal Ratzinger withheld the rites of humiliation that formed the just penalty. The man died in the bosom of the Church. Benedict VI showed the meaning of repentance and Christian love.

Read for yourself, and decide.

The Hebrew Universe

As described in the Old Testament and rendered by artist Michael Paukner. Click the link above to learn more, at i09.

Surprise! Missouri Chose the Conservative

Yesterday, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod gave its president, Gerald Kieschnick, the boot after three consecutive three-year terms. His replacement is Matthew Harrison, whom in the next few days we expect some press coverage will identify as a "conservative" choice of the LCMS. Shocking, we realize.

We generally consider scare quotes appropriate in a situation like this: the "conservative." Because that word really doesn't have much use in religious circles. Viewed historically, for example, the Baptist movement is intensely radical, dedicated to the complete overthrow of everything that preceded it; and yet most Baptists in the US are called "conservative Christians," and embrace the title. Lutheranism, by its nature, is among the most conservative of the Reformation traditions; and yet that is rarely reflected in the press or even the pews. The word is often mere shorthand, used by lazy thinkers and writers who are conditioned by political, rather than ecclesiastical, discourse. (Consider, for example, the Christianity Today headline that tries desperately to link a church convention to the Tea Party movement -- soiling an otherwise quite good article.)

So, that said, what does Harrison's election mean for the LCMS? What was at stake, and what may be expected to change when he takes office in September? We don't have answers, but we mave hints.

First, let's be clear that this election was a sweep of massive proportions. Earlier this month, candidates were nominated, and Harrison's nominations were nearly double Kieschnick's, 1332 to 755. At the actual assembly, Harrison won 54% of the vote, and more than that, he won on the first ballot. This signals a decisive rejection of Kieschnick.

Second, there is a generational difference between the two men. Kieschnick is 67, Harrison is 48. This means that they were born at either end of the Baby Boom. Kieschnick is a Texan, Harrison is from Iowa, and this may be just as important. The accusations within the LCMS have been that Kieschnick has pursued a "mega-church," "church growth movement" style at the expense of traditional Lutheran worship and churchmanship, as well as unity with other Christians at the expense of doctrinal purity. The latter charge seems to be rooted in his support for Atlantic District president David Benke, who once prayed in the presence of unbelievers.

The result is that challenges to Kieschnick, during the past nine years, have come from the wing of the LCMS that sometimes calls itself "Confessional." This is an unfortunate choice of words, since Lutheranism is a confessional movement, and those who do not share its confession of faith fall naturally outside the movement. It would make things easier if they called themselves the "no praise bands" wing or the "no praying in ballparks" wing. But whatever.

Harrison has served most recently as the director of LCMS World Relief and Human Care, and also has an academic interest in Herman Sasse, an important midcentury theologian especially beloved of Missouri. A quick Google search turns up several websites promoting Harrison's candidacy, in a way that reminds us of somebody running for Congress, although with considerably more dignity.

A better sense, not necessarily of who the guy is but of who supports him most vigorously, can be found on the website of a group called "The Brothers of John the Steadfast," after the second Elector of Saxony to support Luther. The site's logo includes this unintentionally droll tag: "Defending and Promoting Confessional Lutheranism and its Media." A quick skim of the site reveals the usual stuff: news posts, some articles on how the liturgy has gone to heck, and so forth. A lot of it, like the bookstore, is "coming soon," meaning that they don't actually have anything. By far the best part of the site is a tab called "No Pietists Allowed." We heartily encourage readers to click and enjoy.

But we confess to a certain concern about, well, the treatment of the fairer sex. The site offers it mission:

[To bring] together Lutheran laymen to defend and promote the orthodox Christian faith which is taught in the Lutheran Confessions, provide financial support for Christian new media ..., and to support other endeavors selected by its membership that defend and promote the cause of confessional Lutheranism.

Nothing wrong here; this is also a pretty good description of ALPB's mission, which makes us wonder why the world needs two of them. And we wonder why, if the mission is to bring together laymen, the main force behind it seems to be a pastor, one Tim Rossow. Most of the contributors seem to be ordained, the notable exception being GetReligion's Mollie Hemingway.

We do note the exclusive-sounding use of "laymen." Perhaps the word is meant, as it often is, to include women. Like Mollie. The usage is old-fashioned, but we at the Egg like old-fashioned usages. Still, we note it because the after the mission statement comes a list of four "challenges":

1. Raise funds for confessional Lutheran new-media like Issues, Etc.
2. Help men support their local pastor in the cause of defending confessional Lutheranism.
3. Support the historic liturgy as a means of conserving the truth of God's word.
4. Encourage and equip husbands to be the spiritual head of their household and a strong voice of leadership in their local congregation.

Help men support their pastor? Um, do women get to help? We hope so, because try running a parish -- any parish -- without 'em. But by the time we get to number 4, about husbands being "a strong voice of leadership in their local congregation," it looks as though Steadfast Lutherans seeks to be a strong voice for what many in the LCMS consider a Biblically-mandated hierarchy, and which to the rest of us looks like an over-the-top level of misogyny. At their worst, these guys make Rome look like a Reimagining Conference.

By the way, the organization's website claims to have a women's auxiliary, named (predictably) for Katie Luther. But when you click the link -- "coming soon."

So, none of this tells us what's really going on in the LCMS, but it does help give a sense of what Harrison's supporters are hoping for. Some of the agenda we support wholeheartedly -- praise bands are the new folk masses, and never forget it. But other points -- screw Benke, keep the ladies in the kitchen -- seem problematic to us.

Having once in our life seen the hand-picked candidate of a protest group elected over a weak and embattled predecessor, we are apprehensive about all this. Harrison will need to show remarkable strength of character if he is to help reverse the decline of his synod, beginning with the ability to heal the wounds his election has caused. He will need to show immense creativity, and he will require the charismata not of personality but of the Holy Spirit. We wish him well.

"Delicta Graviora"

In Roman Catholic canon law, "delicta graviora" are the most serious offenses, and incur the harshest penalties. They are crimes.

The sexual abuse of children is already on this list, as one might expect. New norms from the Vatican, rumored for some weeks and announced recently, double the statute of limitations for reporting such crimes, from 10 to 20 years after the victim's 18th birthday. They also broaden the statute a bit, extending protection not only to children but to the developmentally disabled.

There's nothing wrong with this, and much right with it. A person nearing 40 may be far better prepared emotionally to revisit the initial trauma, in the interests of justice, than one nearing 30. Years of therapy can do that for you.

So why are many Roman Catholics hissing and spitting about the new norms? Glad you asked.

The new norms add to the list of delicta graviora the ordination, or attempted ordination, of a woman. (Both fall under the jurisdiction of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, if you were wondering.)

Ooops. See, now it looks to many observers as though the Vatican is somehow equating the ordination of women with the sexual molestation of children. Any number of headlines today say more or less precisely that. You can imagine the howls of outrage.

Let's try to be fair, shall we? The list of graviora delicta has long included a variety of liturgical abuses, including the "attempted celebration of the [Mass]" by a person not ordained to do so -- a layman, a deacon, etc. Obviously, in Papist eyes, any woman is part of that "etc." In a sense, this is just an extension of the first rule, since "attempted ordination" leads, naturally, to "attempted Eucharistic celebration." (Oh, and by the way: another offense of this stature is the celebration of the Eucharist "with ministers of ecclesial communities ... not in full communion with the Catholic Church." Which is why even your nicest neighbors always turn down those invitations.)

Linked above is a pretty good piece from US Catholic. Brian Cones writes:

Quite frankly, it is an outrage ... to connect the aspirations of some women among the baptized to ordained ministry with what are some of the worst crimes that can be committed against the least of Christ's members.

Furthermore, [t]he Vatican has in effect given legitimacy and momentum to what is still an incredibly tiny movement with this clumsy legal manuver, tantamount to the United States dropping a nuclear weapon on Luxembourg--only more ridiculous because this will do absolutely no damage to women's ordination movement. ...

The faithful have been justly demanding for nearly a decade clear guidelines for dealing with the sexual abuse of children, along with just punishments for both offenders and bishops who have abetted these crimes. What we have gotten is half of what we have been asking for (still no sanctions for bishops), along with a completely unconnected and unnecessary condemnation of the ordination of women. This is especially ironic given that many Catholics, and I include myself among them, see the absence of women in positions of power in the church as a contributor to the ongoing sex abuse crisis.

This move is a mistake, plain and simple, imprudent at best, at worst a serious further blow to Rome's already damaged credibility.

Now, that's his opinion. We're outsiders, and don't really think that the canon law of another church body is any of our business. The precise ranking of abuses -- gave, gravest, or other -- is an internal matter.

What bothers us, and what we do consider part of our shared business with all Christians, is the Vatican's persistent tone-deafness to matters of public perception. Once upon a time, Protestants could rejoice in Papist scandals -- and indeed, Protestants spent much of the Reformation publicizing and even inventing such scandals. But in the present environment, our destinies are linked. The credibility and appeal of all Christianity is in the dock, daily, in the court of public opinion -- and the jury is inclined toward hostility.

Which is why we appeal to Benedict XVI and the Curia, in all sincerity, to stop thinking like legalistic bureaucrats, who can toil away in obscurity, and start thinking like public figures, whose success or failure depends upon being honored and loved by the people.

Schuller's Daughter is a Dickensian Villain

She has sworn to make her poor old father work until he dies.

So, at least, we gather from the LA Times article linked above, in which Sheila Coleman, the daughter of televangelist Robert Schuller, expresses her "outrage" at the "irresponsible" press reports that her 83-year-old father would retire soon.

In fact, Coleman says, he will preach "till the day he dies." This strikes us as a little cruel on her part, since she is the newly-chosen (and newly-ordained) senior pastor of the Crystal Cathedral, and surely has it within her power to give her father a modest pension with which to live out his remaining years. (But perhaps the Reformed Church in America's pension plan has gone the way of Augsburg-Fortress's.)

Joking aside, the truth is that, as we have written before, we are surprised by our own affection for Schuller and the Crystal Cathedral. It isn't our kind of church, by any means, and we can't imagine what the rest of the RCA thinks of it. But a visit some years back helped to soften our cynical edge, by introducing us to real people for whom the "Cathedral" (of a church with no bishops, mind you) was simply their parish, where they gathered with old friends, were shaped by God's Word, buried their dead, and all the others things that people do in church.

Of course, we are not impressed by Schuller's clear desire to pass the church on to his children, as though it were family property. (The 2006 installation of Robert Jr. led to an ugly split). This sort of dynastic impulse, we suspect, represents the principal validation of a celibate ministry.

Still, we wish Coleman and her father well. We also pity her, more than a little, for inheriting a congregation with (a) a $55 million deficit; (b) contributions dropping 27% over two years, and (c) a powerful and overly-involved predecessor. It's a tough first call.

Mad Dog is the New Top Dog

The man now running our war in Afghanistan is USMC Gen. James "Mad Dog" Mattis, described by a Marine magazine as “a leader with almost mythical, rock-star status like Chesty Puller and Al Gray,” and by Danger Room as a "big brain."

He helped Petraeus write the counterinsurgency manual, which rocks; he believes in decentralizing battlefield decision-making, which is counterintuitive in a heavily wired age; and he believes that "the single primary deficiency among senior U.S. officers today is the lack of opportunity for reflective thought,"

All these things make us very happy, and fill us with as much hope as we can muster for Afghanistan. On the other hand, there are a few things worth remembering, including a nasty quotation that seems to reveal a lack of respect for his opponents, despite their considerable success against us. That's just foolish.

By the way, read the Danger Room post, linked above, and some of the comments. The first few say a lot, not only about Mattis but about the attitudes in play these days.

"A Protestant Atheist"

Philip Pullman writes a book; Christopher Hitchens reviews it. When Richard Dawkins reads the thing, we suppose, the circle is complete.

The book in question is called The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ, and it proposes that Mary -- the one you and I may sometimes call a Blessed Virgin -- gave birth to twin sons. One of these is Jesus, a charismatic teacher given to making the occasional over-the-top statements about leaving one's home and family to follow him. The other is Mary's favorite, to whom she gives the private pet name Christ. This, um, Christ makes it his business to write down the things that his brother says and does. Encouraged by a nameless Greek fellow, Christ takes ever greater liberties with the truth, turning more-or-less ordinary events (people sharing food so that everybody eats) into supernatural ones (a miraculous feeding).

We have not read the book, and yet Hitch's description seemed instantly familiar. Of course it did -- we had learned it all in seminary. (Or rather, since our own seminary prided itself on a neo-orthodox disposition, we learned there to dislike it.) This is the Gospel according to the Jesus Seminar. It is little more than story told by two centuries, and more, of theological liberalism. Heck, PBS even made the same point, with a series called "From Jesus to Christ." Get it? Cuz they're different.

Once you hypothesize an "historical Jesus" who can be distinguished from the Jesus described by Scripture, and start making claims about him which are not supported by Scripture, you arrive pretty quickly at the place where Pullman seems to be: believing that "a good man" has been betrayed by a cabal of priests and schemers who, for their own purposes, turned him into the Son of God. Pullman even claims that his character's logia are "much closer to what Jesus would have said." Closer, apparently, than the Bible.

Hitchens gets this, and sums it up quite nicely:

This is ... to raise the possibility that Christianity can be salvaged from itself, or at any rate from its later accretions, by a sort of “back to basics” revisionism. The difficulty that Pullman never quite confronts is that this involves ... an unmediated contact with the original message. Atheist though he is, Pullman turns out to be a Protestant atheist.

This is a clever turn of phrase, even if owes a debt to Leslie Wetherhead's "Christian Agnostic." Indeed, it seems pretty clear the Pullman and Wetherhead do drink from the same fonts, the difference being only in how they respond to what we may call, for lack of a less ugly phrase, "the liberalist hypothesis" concerning Jesus. One, concluding that the stories don't fit with a credible reality, concludes that they matter for other reasons; the second concludes that the whole thing has been a vicious sham which he will now unveil. (Paging Bart Ehrmann, as well as every other disappointed fundamentalist.)

Anyway, the review is modestly interesting, if only as further testimony to something we have long believed, which s that much (but not all) of the "New Atheism" is really just the howling of disappointed Christians. It has less to do with truth and falsehood than with their own emotions and experiences.

Unicorns and Peace

We at the Egg may have a mean streak, but it's purely rhetorical. Truth is that we are a bunch of pussycats, who wish good things for everybody, and go to sleep dreaming of unicorns and world peace.

So we are not happy that a suicidal man named Derek Thomas was admitted to a hospital in Louisiana recently, and that when he refused to put on the standard-issue gown and tried to leave, he was tasered by the security guards. Nor are we happy that this brought on an epileptic seizure.

Nor, and this is the point, is our unhappiness in any way diminished by fact that this poor man is the nephew of our least-favorite Supreme Court justice. (Scalia is more evil, but kind of funny about it; Clarence "Bump on a Log" Thomas just ticks us off) The taser epidemic has spread rapidly; where once it was reserved for loutish frat boys at John Kerry speeches, voltage is now applied to pregnant drivers, emotionally overwrought grandmothers, and, well, members of the Thomas family.

No, this does not please us. But we do wonder whether this will make Justice Thomas reconsider his vote in a recent decision, regarding the vicious attack on a prison inmate who asked a guard for a grievance form. Thomas figured there was nothing much wrong with it, because the guy didn't suffer permanent injury.

We like to think that this will encourage Thomas to reconsider. But we also dream of unicorns and world peace.

Theology as Poetry, Part II

Having written the post below, which introduces a plea for theology considered not as if it were a precise science but as if it were a form of art, Father Anonymous slept quite poorly. This actually had more to do with a nauseated wife and a needy toddler than with either theology or blogging, but still it gave him time to think. And here is what he thought about:

Marcus Terentius Varro.

Varro, acclaimed as the most learned man in Rome during the collapse of the Republic, was a highly prolific author. Sadly, the vast bulk of his life's work is lost to us, including the Antiquitates rerum humanarum et divinarum. (The fragments of this book have been collected, with German commentary, by Burkhardt Cardauns.) The best-known device from the Antiquitates, and the one that echoed in your poor sleepless blogger's head, is discussed by St Augustine in Civ. Dei 8:6, the "tripertite [sic] theology."

Varro divides pagan theology into three categories:

• mythic (or "fabulous," or "poetic," depending upon your translation) -- the popular description of the deeds of the gods used by, for example, playwrights;
• physical (or "natural," or "philosophical") -- philosophical meditation upon the gods and the universe, of a kind "which men's ears can more easily hear inside the walls of a school than outside in the Forum." (CD 8:6:6, quoting Varro);
• civil (or "political") -- the rites prescribed by priests for public uses, such as watching birds in flight or studying a bull's entrails to determine the outcome of a day's battle (our example, not Varro's).

We cannot trust Augustine's witness completely, since his goal is to discredit pagan theology in any form. But Augustine says that Varro, as a man of cultivated intellect, finds the vulgar legends contemptible, and so criticizes the mythic theology freely, and would criticize the civil theology as freely if he were not constrained by fear of outraging the powerful. After all, those old stories full of animals and sex and sexy animals (Europa, Leda, etc.) are kind of creepy, and the civil rites are just as bad. Augustine has particular fun with the customs surrounding marriage, in which so many gods need to be appeased that the bridal chamber is full of them, even before the bride is expected to sit on the unnaturally large, um, member of Priapus.

The problem with mythic theology is that it betrays the work of natural theology, by reducing the gods to caricatures when it does not simply lie about them.

Being philosophical types, both Varro and Augustine seem inclined to respect "natural," or philosophical theology, in the latter case so long as it is subject to Christian revelation. And thereby hangs a tale, since Augustine is, by any reasonable account, the critical Christian thinker after the Biblical writers themselves. What our faith became, after the 5th century and especially after the 16th, it became in many ways because of Augustine. Even if his own theological method wasn't truly "natural" in the Varronian sense, it was shaped by the methods of academic philosophy -- close attention to rhetoric and etymology, for example; the constant drive toward abstraction, for another. This is the sort of abstruse, technical writing that most Christians mean when they talk about theology, especially of the sort called systematic or dogmatic.

It didn't have to be this way. The earliest Christian theological anthology, the New Testament, includes quite a variety of genres, and, although Varro's schema cannot easily be superimposed upon it, we can without too much stretching identify the narrative portions as mythic, and divide the epistles up between the three types, with an emphasis upon a philosophical exegesis of the myth. (This is not, we say again as clearly as possible, "natural theology" in the full sense the term has since acquired; but Paul and especially the author of Hebrews are "natural" in the original sense of philosophical reflection).

But setting Scripture aside as a unique case, it is easy to see Varro's theological modes at work in the next generations of Christian literature. The Shepherd of Hermas and Lactantius' Phoenix are clearly mythic, as (in another way) is the vast literature of dubious "history," from Lactantius's Deaths of the Persecutors to the ever-more-spurious "gospels," acta and passiones. The Didache and later church orders are civil, at least so far as there was a Christian "city" before Constantine. And academic philosophical reflection is everywhere, particularly in Alexandria. All of these methods of theological writing seem to have been given equal standing, up to the fourth century. After the Constantinian establishment, civil theology gained ground; and after an era dominated by Augustine and the Cappadocians, so too did the vision of theology as an intellectual enterprise, best suited to monks and scholars.

But mythic theology was left behind. Worse than that, it was discredited. And worse still, it was discredited because it became incredible. As Christian theology came to be identified more and more with systematic speculation on one hand and prescriptive ritualism on the other, the theology of narrative and metaphor became identifiably third-rate, the "popular religiosity" of the Middle Ages which reaches its nadir, we suppose, in the Legenda Aurea. Much of it was suitable for children and mental defectives. To the eyes of an Aquinas or Bernard, we can only imagine that these ludicrous legends looked as contemptible as the popular drama had to Varro. Both the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation (think of the Bollandists) launched attacks upon the worst excesses, while creating new versions of their own.

We haven't got much further since. There is still a "mythic theology" among Christians, and it still isn't good for much, consisting as it does mostly of superstition compounded with bad theology and worse art, much of it directly at odds with the official teaching of any particular church. It overlaps with what sociologists call "civil religion," which -- whew -- shouldn't be confused with Varro's civil theology.

But consider this. The "mythic" theology derided by Varro and Augustine includes, along with the usual amounts of forgotten tripe, things like Homer, Ovid and Euripides -- household names even today, and writers cherished even by those who do not believe in their gods. They are no less central to our culture than Plato or Aristotle, and in some ways perhaps even a little more so.

The question, then, is whether modern Christianity has room for a kind of theological investigation largely abandoned sixteen centuries ago. Can serious theology any longer be done with tools other than those of logic and argument, and without using language so abstract it might as well be mathematics?

It is tempting to say, "Ah, but of course there has always been great Christian art. Wasn't Bach a theologian?" With all due respect to the dozens of people who have taught courses by that title, no, he was not. He was an artist, serving the Church and using his art to promulgate its teachings. This is quite an impressive thing by itself, made more so by the fact that he succeeded so brilliantly. We are talking about something else, something different from Christian art -- although in perfect honesty, we aren't quite sure what. We are talking about something as different from the Sistine Chapel as the Sistine Chapel is itself from a a traditional icon. That is to say, something that uses many of the same tools, and that may even treat some of the same subjects, but which lifts them to a new level.

Perhaps we mean something like this: Christian art, even at its best, serves either to support or (on some occasions) to rebut the doctrine agreed upon by "the theologians." When we try to imagine a mythic theology, we are seeking a kind of discourse which would create doctrine, just as systematic theology does -- not by itself, but in dialogue with the rest of the Church. It is a tall order, so tall that we can't quite see the top of it. But we think it is worth a look anyway.

Theology as Poetry

Here's an interesting little HuffPo piece by Jason Derr, that touches on a subject that has concerned us for many years, and introduces a theologian with whom we were previously unfamiliar.

We have long thought that, to oversimplify a bit, the word "theology" creates the false expectation of an exact science, comparable to, say, biology. To our amusement and chagrin, many theologians and pastors attempt to remedy the problem by speaking only of something called "God-talk." This is condescending and irrelevant, largely because it is not the word itself which creates the false expectation, so much as the heritage of the Latin and German theological traditions, with their commitment to hair-splitting and self-confidence.

Going after the same idea, Derr begins with some blather about Teilhard de Chardin, and makes it worse with a de rigeur appeal to 9/11 and a nonsensical claim that "When we make religions about absolute truths then we freeze them in the past instead of recognizing them as living traditions that grow and breathe in the present." This is well-intentioned, but misleading. Most religion, by its nature, is at least partially "about" ultimate, and therefore absolute, truths. What we believe that Derr means is something closer to: "When a religious movement devotes itself to the conservation and repristination of a particular dogmatic proposition, it loses the ability to connect with a changing intellectual and social environment."

(Even this proposition is debatable. Lutheranism, for example, is a species of Christianity which exists largely in order to promulgate one single proposition, that of justification by grace through faith. Yet Lutheranism has produced many theologians, from Kierkegaard to Bonhoeffer to Lindbeck, whose work is wrapped up in the attempt to connect ancient and modern thought.)

Fortunately, Derr moves quickly beyond this to something better. He mentions the Congregationalist minister and Harvard professor, Amos Niven Wilder (1895-1993), whom he describes as

a biblical scholar and theologian who wrote the book Theopoetics. Amos Niven Wilder argued that theology must be poetic, or articulated in the images, contexts, hungers, desires, questions, passions and concerns of the current age. Niven Wilder wanted a theology of the cross that spoke to the "believer, skeptic and secular mystic".

This is more interesting. It is also, incidentally, a fair description of Bonhoeffer's project. Derr goes on to talk about Jeremiah Wright, whose ill-fated, um, jeremiads are best described as a kind of poetry, reduced to mere prose by a hostile press. His concluding graf is quite good:

Poetry and metaphor are important as ways of doing theology. In a world so divided by absolute claims, using metaphor and poetry allows us to have room for flex. It allows congregations to "see-as" as they wrestle with the vagaries and uncertainties of life. To see-as theologically means to enter into [Jan] Zwicky's ideas on metaphor and create poetries that mark our progress on the way of Jesus. We seek less to tell the absolutes of what we must believe and more to articulate the poetries that express how we believe and which draw us deeper contemplation and discipleship.

This isn't bad. Derr is struggling too hard against the straw man of fundamentalism, and this struggle forces him to fuss about "flex" versus "absolute claims." Murky theology does nobody any favors; it allows weak minds to create monsters. And in fact, a sufficiently strong metaphor can serve as an absolute claim, far more effectively than a debatable proposition. An argument can be debated and adjusted, but the strongest metaphors destroy their alternatives. (Hence the "unacknowledged legislators of the world," and all that.)

But his bigger point, which is that there is a kind of theology which depends less upon the tools of logic than upon those of poetry, is well taken. We think, for example, of Efrem Syrus, who is not nearly as quotable as Tertullian, but may be far deeper. We think also of the most glowing compliment we have ever heard paid to a preacher, when after visiting a church one Sunday, Our Beloved Godfather described the pastor as "standing in the pulpit like a blind Homeric bard, neither reading nor reciting the sermon, but rather seeming to channel it from the depths of time and space." Or something like that.

McCain Sells Out Yet Again

During the 2008 presidential campaign, we said some pretty harsh things about Senator John McCain. (Typical header: "McCain Wants Soul Back; Devil Says 'TooLate' ").

Since then, we have often wondered whether we were a bit too harsh. After all, McCain was a man we had admired or many years. He had served his country with astonishing courage during Viet Nam, and often sided with what was left of the good old "common sense" Republican Party, to which we still pledge our allegiance in the event that it ever returns.

More often than you might expect, we wake up at night in a cold sweat, staring at the ceiling and whispering, "Did we do wrong by old Jack?"

Here's the short answer: No.

As the brief Gawker post, linked above, reminds us, McCain would sell out his grandmother for one more moment of political power. He is a man of no convictions, except perhaps the mistaken one that he remains fit for public service.

America at 235: Crazier Than Ever

Don't get us wrong; we love our country with an abiding passion. We love its geography, its people, and its Constitution. There is nothing like living somewhere else (and especially a nation still licking its wounds after 40 years of Communism) to make you appreciate the Glorious Fourth.

And yet, much as we value free speech, we often wish it weren't so routinely abused by liars, thugs and outright morons. Ditto freedoms of the press and religion -- and, not incidentally to this discussion, the franking privilege.

We are stunned by the campaign advertisement of one Rick Barber, seeking the Republican nomination for Congress in Alabama. The video, as described by Ruth Marcus in the WaPo, tries to suggest that the current policies of the American government are essentially identical to those of the pre-Civil War South and Nazi Germany. It is "slavery" to pay taxes, at least if those taxes are paid "so a total stranger can get a free meal, medical procedure or a bailout." (Ironic note: Barber is an ex-Marine, meaning that for four years, our taxes paid for his meals and medical procedures.)

More stunning still are his over-the-phone remarks to Marcus:

"We can't be so naive to think that just because we live in America that [slavery and Nazism, apparently] can't happen to us," he said. "We are being fed a socialist agenda spoon by spoon, and we don't see it coming. In Germany, when Hitler was first elected under the Socialist Party, no one would have thought in a million years it would have gone where it did."

Really, Rick? Really?

We know that this guy isn't the best his party can do, and Marcus assures us that his candidacy is a long shot. But we also gather that his rhetoric -- Obama as Hitler, for example -- is gaining popularity with the Tea party people. This unnerves us. We will be relieved, and greatly so, when his campaign explodes like an Independence Day firecracker, all noise and no real destructive power.

"Fun Bags"

If you're preaching come Sunday, you could do worse than to look at the first lesson (in the "thematic" series), Isaiah:66:10-14. We are struck especially by image of "drinking deeply with delight from [Jerusalem's] glorious bosom."

We come to this, lately, moved less by the feminist impulse, which excavates maternal images wherever they can be found in Scripture, than by the parental one, which spends a disproportionate amount of mental effort on breastfeeding. (Baby Anonymous, at 3+ years, is still nursing away, even as he begins reciting the Nicene Creed from memory.)

As most readers surely know, the subject of breastfeeding is nearly as incendiary as that of descriptive grammar. Offer an opinion on the subject, nearly any opinion, and prepare to be berated without mercy by those who consider you an apostle of either Satan or Nestle, if indeed they make a distinction. Nor, as Rowan Pelling says in the brief article linked above, has the subject aroused controversy only in the modern age of infant formula and political correctness. Aristotle and Pliny offered their opinions, too. (Here is the article from which we suspect that Pelling borrowed most of her background information, a few bits nearly verbatim. We have been unable to find the classical citations, and will be grateful for pointers).

Setting aside the history, though, Pelling cites some especially galling recent dicta on the subject. Here is her lead witness:

... a provocative article just published in Mother & Baby magazine has acted like kerosene on a conflagration. The author, Kathryn Blundell (the magazine's deputy editor), wrote that she bottle-fed her babies because: "I wanted my body back ... and some wine," and she wanted her breasts: "on my chest, rather than dangling round my stomach".

However, the most controversial part of Bundell's polemic came when she said of her breasts: "They're part of my sexuality too – not just breasts, but fun bags. And when you have that attitude (and I admit I made no attempt to change it), seeing your teeny, tiny innocent baby latching on where only a lover has been before feels, well, a little creepy."

Many people seem to agree, not least the lad mags, whose attitude seems to permeate the discussion ("fun bags"? Yikes.). This prompts Pelling to ask, in her title, "Does a lover really have first claim on breasts?" Her answer is No; she renders judgment in favor of the baby. It strikes us that one might also argue with some force that the first claim belongs to the mother herself -- her body, her choice, and all that. But maybe we're trapped in the late 1970s.

Anyhoo, coming back to Sunday. A preacher willing to dare the wrath of the Breast Police might talk about all this, in a gentle way, and then ask what it means to drink from Jerusalem's glorious bosom. It is one thing to be children of God," in the Johannine fashion, but a slightly different thing to be children of Jerusalem. Unless one leaps (too hastily, we think) to the New Jerusalem of Revelation, the implication seems to support the Pauline imagery of Gentiles grafted "against nature" onto the tree of israel.

Dept. of No Surprise: African Edition

After declaring, quite loudly and publicly, that the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania would reject assistance from (soon-to-be-former) partner churches which support same-sex marriage, ELCT Presiding Bishop Alex Malasusa now says, "Well, I can't say that. I really can't commit to anything." he is, one remembers, suddenly, a bishop.

Now, let's speak some of the unspokens here. Malasusa's original remark was taken as a slap at the American church, the ELCA, and his second remark comes after an initial (and one imagines polite but firm) discussion with the ELCA's presiding bishop Mark Hanson. The RNS article linked above also includes a journalistically dubious series of comments from Pr. Jaynan Clark (who before her divorce was Jaynan Clark Egland) leader of the anti-ELCA splinter group WordAlone. Clark indulges in characteristic rhetorical excess, by saying "I can't see how anything but the money could be influencing [the ELCT's]the ELCT would be taking position," and that the ELCT would be taking "blood money."

It all looks as though Malasusa is backpedalling rapidly, to keep his church from losing the million bucks per year that the RNS article says the ELCA provides. (We suspect that the number is low. It probably reflects direct aid from one national church to another, and does not include gifts provided by individual synods and congregations.) That is certainly Egland's -- damn, we meant Clark's -- implication.

What Malasusa will probably say, however, is that in fact, the ELCA does not support same-sex marriage. This is true. The ELCA presently supports the blessing of same-sex unions for the purpose of public accountability. This isn't called "marriage" in the official documents, and doesn't require the church to take a position on the matter of how marriage should be defined under either church or civil law. Whether the distinction is important, or will survive a few years of refinement, nobody knows. But at the moment, Malasusa has feasible, if not entirely plausible, deniability.

So here is what we expect Malasusa, having opened his big mouth, will eventually do. He may (1) go the humble route -- "Actually, this is all a big misunderstanding; I was talking about those wretched Swedes, who don't give me nearly as much money as the Americans"; or more likely he will (2) go the self-aggrandizing route, and say "I have conferred with my brother bishop Mark Hanson, and sternly warned him on behalf of all Africa not to do what he doesn't do or plan to do, so now we can be friends again and I can get my million bucks".

We aren't quite sure what Malasusa thought his first comment would accomplish. Did he really imagine that the ELCA would change course in response to his threat not to accept its money? Was he really prepared to simply forgo the fruits of a long and -- crass remarks about money aside -- spiritually fruitful partnership? And if not, where did he think it was all going to wind up, except with his own inevitable clarification-which-is-not-technically-a retraction?

Judge Martin Feldman May Have Lied

Or he may have been confused, or he may be senile. We genuinely don't know.

But here's what we do know, at least per the Wall Street Journal: that on last Tuesday, Feldman sold his ExxonMobil stock, worth something less than $15,000. And that Feldman has said, in a letter to the Administrative Office of the US Courts, "that he sold his shares at the opening of the stock market on Tuesday, 'prior to the opening of a court hearing on the spill moratorium case.' "

If true, this would mean that Feldman had removed a potential appearance-of-conflict-of-interest, just a few hours before issuing a judgment. If true. The problem is that the court hearing wasn't held on Tuesday. It was held on Monday.

So, um, which part of his letter is false? We aren't sure, but we expect somebody will figure it out soon enough.

Oh, and here's another point of confusion: How much energy-sector stock does Feldman really own? One of our commenters (and about a million others elsewhere on the Net) place it at something like $15k, which isn't a lot of moolah by the standards of an affluent judge. (By the standards of an impecunious preacher man, it's quite a bundle. But we digress.)

The WSJ piece says that Exxon was the only company "affected" in which Feldman appears to own any stock. But this article lists several others companies in his portfolio whose financial interests might be linked to the fate of BP. We expect that it's a matter of definitions, but still -- the guy has some interest (however slight) in Halliburton, which -- in addition to being profoundly evil for other reasons* -- "provided the failed cement casings on the Deepwater Horizon."

____________________________________________

* Do we really need to spell it out?

"Unconscionable"

That's what Hope Lutheran Church calls a recent article about its pastor, Tom Brock. And we agree wholeheartedly.

Under Brock's leadership, Hope left the ELCA not long ago, complaining bitterly about its plans to accept the service of gay pastors in committed and publicly accountable same-sex partnerships. A bad move, in our opinion, but one that's not the point here.

The point is that a magazine called Lavender has since discovered that Brock attends a confidential 12-step program for people struggling with their homosexuality. It did this by sending in an undercover reporter, who then reported what happened. In the confidential meetings.

There's a word for this sort of reporting: Unethical. Also cruel, and deceitful. The MinnPost article linked above does a good job of drawing out some of the ethical problems, up to and including the outright hypocrisy of the Lavender staff. Bottom line: they call them "anonymous" for a reason.

Regular readers know that we enjoy publicizing the hypocrisy of those we dislike. (The picture of Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam hangs over out bed like a sacred talisman). But in Brock's case, there is no hypocrisy. Brock wasn't caught soliciting sex in an airport bathroom, or traveling with a companion from "Rentboy.com." He thinks of his own sexual longing as a disorder, and he is seeking help. We may think that he is mistaken, both about the nature of sexuality and about the nature of the Church, but we see nothing in this story which reveals a lack of integrity.

On Brock's part, that is. Lavender is quite another story.

Does Judge Martin Feldman Own Oil Company Stock?

We have no idea. But given what we do know about the judges in the Gulf Coast states, it would not surprise us in the least.

In any event, Judge Feldman has blocked the Obama Administration's proposed 6-month moratorium on deepwater drilling. (Bad decision here). This doesn't necessarily mean that he is corrupt, nor even that he is so blinded by the combination of his personal financial interests and a reflexive support for big corporations, no matter how irresponsibly they behave. Not necessarily.

He could just be stupid.

However, given what little we know about him (degree from Tulane, 27 years on the bench, advisor to the American Academy for the Advancement of Science, lecturer at Cambridge and Princeton) we don't think he's stupid. Which only leaves a couple of other choices.

We trust that, come morning, the press will have given us more with which to fulminate.

Incompetent Terrorist is Still a Problem

The guy who tried to blow up his own car in Times Square, and couldn't even do that right, doesn't sound like much of a threat, does he? We only wish that more of the world's bomb-makers were as inept.

And after the fizzled fact, Faizal Shahzad is doing the right thing, so far as his distorted worldview permits, by cooperating with investigators, and pleading guilty in court. Saves everybody a lot of time and money.

Don't get us wrong: he's still a creep. His plea, as reported by the AP, is couched in all the usual self-righteous twaddle: This is war and I'm a soldier; deliberately killing innocents en masse is fine because the US sometimes kills a few by accident; and anyway, all Americans are guilty, because they elect their government. (We are especially amused by that last claim, which effectively exempts many of the world's Muslims from guilt, since they live in despotic autocracies).

But what next? Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum asked him if he understood that he might spend the rest of his life in prison, and he said that he did. Well, duh. Of course he does. And that's the problem -- jail is the one place where this loser can actually do any harm. He can spread his self-serving fanaticism among the most disaffected members of American society, our vast population of the incarcerated. And even if Shazad is too stupid to make a bomb work, it is likely that some of his converts will be able to do so.

If Shahzad were a real soldier, fighting on a real battlefield, he would probably have been shot outright, thus mooting the point. If captured, he would eventually be set free -- in his own country. But the man is an American citizen, who committed a crime in his own country. Under our laws, he isn't going to be executed. He's going to be locked away with other criminals, some of whom may drink from the well of his nihilism and emerge from prison eager to kill.

We at the Egg don't support the death penalty or long-term isolation of prisoners. But we genuinely aren't sure what else to do with somebody like this.

Finnish Loudmouth Strikes Blow Against Ecumenism

We're looking at you, Bishop Teemu Sippu.

The Church of Finland elected its first woman bishop recently, Irja Askola. She is the new Bishop of the Helsinki diocese. To celebrate, Sippu -- the Roman Catholic bishop -- called the choice of a woman, any woman, "unfortunate," saying that it "would put more distance between the churches."

Sure, we guess. But so what? Will it create more more meaningful distance than the many female bishops already serving in Europe and America? More than the ordination of women? More than the principled rejection of transubstantiation, mandatory clerical celibacy, and the treasury of merits? The Thirty Years' War? The excommunication of Luther? No, not really.

In fact, it seems to us that the elevation of Bishop Askola is a pretty modest thing, common enough among Lutherans and of no inherent ecumenical importance. Unless somebody, perhaps playing to elements in his own crowd, wants to turn it into an issue by opening his big mouth.

Because if you really want to put distance between your church and your neighbor's, start meddling in their internal affairs and criticizing their choice of leaders. That will do the job nicely.

Store-Front Mercenary Shops!

Why not? They've already got the name recognition.

Of course, let's remember just what Blackwater's name is recognized for. Allegations in clude the murder of 17 Iraqi civilians; using child prostitutes; arranging for a corrupt Iraqi politician to break out of jail; hiring 60 or so of Pinochet's old crew. That kind of stuff.

Still, what is the old PR saying? "It doesn't matter what they write, as long as they spell your name correctly." So if you're in Fayetteville NC or Salem CT, drop into one of the opening-soon Blackwater Pro Shops. Or shop online. As Danger Room points out, they'll sell you anything from a beer glass to a rifle.

Do the Gulf State Judges Own BP ... Or Vice-Versa?

We'll find out soon enough, since we all know where the oil spill is going to spend the next twenty years. In addition to the seashores, bayous and estuaries.

ThinkProgress, linked above, notes that federal judges in the Gulf states are so closely tied to the energy industry that, a couple of months back, eight of the 16 judges on the 5th Circuit bench had to recuse themselves en banc from a related case -- meaning that there was no quorum, and the appeal could not be heard. (WSJ blog here).

If you're wondering, as many do, why Tony Hayward hasn't resigned yet, here's why: (1) he isn't answerable to his stockholders in any meaningful way; and (2) he knows he won't be answerable to the courts, either.

His "Pre-Existing Condition"

Philip Johnson, formerly an ELCA pastor, was recently ordained as a Roman Catholic priest. A rather sweet article, linked above, talks about it, and includes one funny tidbit:

Although Johnson is the second married priest in its history (the Rev. George McCormick, a former Episcopal priest, served from 1984 until his death in 2000), the Camden [N.J.] Diocese is still learning how to fit the couple in.

"The insurance forms for priests don't have a line for 'wife,' " Janet Johnson said. "I told them I'm his 'preexisting condition.' "

"Philip Johnson" is a fairly common name -- there are two presently listed within the ELCA ministerium. For clarification, this article is about Philip Max Johnson, who served parishes in Jersey City and is well-known in evangelical catholic circles both for his Lutheran Forum articles and for his leadership within the Society of the Holy Trinity. He switched sides in 2006.

Because we do not know Johnson except by reputation (and little enough even of that), we knew none of the biographical information described in the article. For example, we didn't know that he had been graduated in 1979 from a seminary in New Jersey for which we ourselves have a grudging affection. Nor did we know that during his seminary education, and for many years afterward, he was not a Lutheran but a member of the Church of Christ (we presume this means the Campbellites, but will be happy for a correction). Johnson, with his wife Janet, left the church in which he had been raised and ordained to become Lutheran only in 1986.

We did not know this. Yet we are not surprised.

It has been our observation that a great many ELCA pastors who leave for other ecclesiastical pastures have had the prior experience of leaving their church in a huff because it did not measure up to their standards. Typically, this was the LCMS in the 1970s, and we certainly blame nobody for choosing to leave it. But it does mark them as perpetual pilgrims, seeking a purity they are unlikely to find this side of Paradise.

The otherwise respectable article, by the way, contains one ludicrous whopper which must not be allowed to go unchallenged:

At the time of [Philip and Janet Johnson's] conversion, mainstream Lutheranism seemed headed toward rapprochement with the Roman Catholic Church. But when the main Lutheran sects grew liberal and allowed female clergy, the faiths drifted apart.

Say what? First off, the timeline: by 1986, the Lutheran church that Johnson entered had already been ordaining women for more than 15 years. In 1986, US Lutherans were busily forging the ELCA, and rapprochement with one another was quite challenging enough, thank you. Second, define "rapprochement." Because the two bodies have lived uneasily with one another for centuries, but by far their greatest shared ecumenical achievement, the Joint Declaration on Justification, was signed in 1999. Yes, the pace of these things is glacial -- but still, JDDJ is probably the closest to a "rapprochement" yet reached between the Roman church and any of her Reformation daughters, and one can only imagine that there will be more to come. So what does this paragraph actually mean?

Well, it might mean that the Johnsons are very dim people, who in 1986 somehow didn't know about the ordination of women, and who actually imagined that a 450-year-old reform movement was a few short years away from declaring victory and going home. But from what little we know about Johnson, he is a sharp cookie indeed. So what, then?

We strongly suspect that a well-intentioned reporter simply repeated the self-serving and sententious tommyrot that his source fed him. Which is why fact-checking is such a good idea.

Environmentalists Caused Gulf Oil Spill

Just ask Sarah Palin. Seriously.

Our Own Mythologies

Collateralized debt obligations, CDOs, were piles of triple-B mortgage bonds that were going to turn to gold. What won’t Wall Street believe?

So asks the indispensable Arts & Letters Daily. It is their blurb for a glowing review of the new book by Michael Lewis, a career financial reporter who himself believed the hokum, right up until the world's economy tanked. His new book, The Big Short, is the story of the small number of financiers who did not believe, and who bet heavily against CDOs. In other words, the smart guys.

Good subject, to be sure. But it is the blurb that really engages us. "What won't Wall Street believe?" It is tempting to think of the modern markets as the exclusive preserve of mathematical wizards, pulled from promising academic careers and able to manipulate numbers in ways that normal people can't. Indeed, one frequently hears some variation upon this story as a rationale for the stratospheric bonuses to which investment bankers have become accustomed: they are so damn smart that they are irreplaceable, not only to their firms but to the global economy."

(Strangely, we heard this very idea proposed by an international businessman just recently. He earns his living by recruiting engineers, and complained that for many years "the smartest guys" had been lured away from engineering by finance. We stared at him for a few seconds, as slack-jawed as Cletus, and quietly asked how smart a fisherman can be, when he drops a bomb into the place where the fish breed.)

In fact, as the CDO bust demonstrates, the supposed whiz kids were as dumb as anybody else. They created a myth, and then believed it: that the smartest people on earth had created tools so powerful and complex that normal people, like the government, had neither the ability nor the right to examine them. They still believe the first part of that myth, since they think they deserve those bonuses, even after destroying their own world and much of ours as well.

All of which leaves us at the Egg wondering what other readily-falsifiable stories are floating around, and deserve to be regarded as myths both in the elevated sense of "stories by which we organize our lives," and the vulgar one of "damn lies."

A&L Daily offers a ready instance, providentially just above the CDO story. It links to a piece about Ayn Rand, the novelist and conservative icon who famously claimed that "I do not fake reality and never will." In fact, as two new biographies show, she was an amphetamine-addled fantasist who lied, in small ways and large, almost constantly.

A fiction-writer with some reliability issues is unremarkable by itself. Gore Vidal once said, "You can always identify the future novelist in any grade-school classroom. He's the pathological liar." Rand, however, is more than just a novelist. She has been the inspiration for generations of conservative intellectuals, including Ronald Reagan, Clarence Thomas, and Alan Greenspan.

Now, it does not necessarily follow that modern American conservatism is built upon an elaborate fabric of fantasies passed off as objective -- or "Objectivist" -- truth. To even argue such a case, one would need similar evidence against Milton Friedman and Freidrich Hayek, for starters. But we cannot help thinking of Greenspan's 2008 testimony before Congress, in which he admitted outright that his belief in industry self-regulation, a staple of conservative ideology, was just ... completely ... wrong.

What other pseudo-scientific ideological claims have been exploded in recent memory? Consider the "experts" who advised many Roman Catholic bishops that priests who abused children could be cured by time at a retreat center, and then sent back into the parish. Or the Murray/Herrnstein "Bell Curve". Or, in an entirely different category, the supposed "evidence" for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, as well as the rest of the neocon/theocon case for that war.

To be sure, liberals have their own beloved "facts" which are difficult to actually prove. Anybody remember the "gay gene"? Alger Hiss's "innocence"? And that's not even mentioning outright whoppers, like the Gulf of Tonkin "incident". On the whole, however, it does seem to us that Democrats do a slightly better job than Republicans of relying upon evidence rather than theories as tools for government.

All of which reminds us of two things. First, that skepticism, joined to a zeal for the facts, is almost always rewarded. In that sense, the "hermeneutic of suspicion" beloved of feminist Biblical studies is simply a logical reaction to a world awash in ideology separated from fact. Second, we are reminded of Luther's straightforward definition of a god: "the thing upon which you set your heart and in which you place your trust." But he then adds that some gods are false and others -- well, Another -- are genuine. The truth of what we believe, as Luther says, is the difference between faith and idolatry.